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Louisville baseball ends regular season with 9-4 win over Wake Forest

Steven Branscombe-USA TODAY Sports

The Louisville baseball team will enter the postseason owning both a nine-game winning streak and the No. 1 RPI in the country. U of L wrapped up the 2016 regular season with a 9-4 thumping of Wake Forest, giving the Cards a three-game road sweep and their 15th victory in 16 games.

Kyle Funkhouser recovered from a shaky opening frame to win for the fifth time in his last five starts. The senior right-hander gave up three runs on two home runs in the top of the first, but bounced back to work six scoreless innings afterward, in which he struck out 10 Demon Deacons.

The Louisville offense dug out of the early deficit for good in the 7th inning, when Brendan McKay launched a three-run, 412-foot home run off the light pole in right field to turn a 3-3 tie into a 6-3 Cardinal advantage. That blast came three innings after Danny Rosenbaum had evened the score with 420-foot, two-run bomb in the visitor's half of the 4th inning.

Dan McDonnell's team will now turn its attention to next week's ACC Tournament, where it will be the No. 2 overall seed. Miami locked up the top seed with its 8-5 win over Florida State. Play begins Tuesday, May 24.

The Cards are the No. 1 team in another set of rankings, however. Florida's 7-3 loss to LSU allowed Louisville to move up and claim the top spot in the updated college baseball RPI rankings. It's the first time U of L has sat at No. 1 this season.

Now the real fun starts.